


over the creek

by orestes



Series: tumblr fics [1]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - No Hale Fire, Cats, Domestic, M/M, Roommates, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-18
Updated: 2015-09-18
Packaged: 2018-04-21 08:58:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,647
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4823015
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orestes/pseuds/orestes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Two grown adults living together, and we can’t even keep our fridge stocked.” Stiles shakes his head. “That’s pretty bad, isn’t it?” He’s twirling the pen between his long fingers, and his chin is propped up in his other hand, a lazy smirk on his lips. “We’d be the first to die in the apocalypse.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	over the creek

**Author's Note:**

> originally posted [on my tumblr](http://falsealpha.tumblr.com/post/129356013995/13-sterek) for the prompt 'things you said at the kitchen table'. i maybe cheated a little with the last one, since things are not technically said at a table, but it's close enough. i hope u can find it in your hearts to forgive me. thanks to [coloringsenses](http://coloringsenses.tumblr.com) for the beta!

**September**

“You’re not going to find much in there.”

Derek pauses, leaving the fridge door half-open so his arms are exposed to the pleasantly cool air. He constantly feels like he’s running too hot since their AC unit broke last week. He turns his head just enough to raise an eyebrow at Stiles.

“We’re out of everything,” Stiles elaborates without taking the pen he’s holding between his lips out of his mouth. “No milk, no eggs, no bacon, no cheese.” He waves the notebook in his hand in Derek’s direction. “I’m gonna do a grocery run after my morning class. Want me to get you anything?”

Derek turns back to the fridge and scans the shelves, cataloguing what they need.

There’s a bag of sad looking salad with a use-by date that passed almost a week ago and a couple of slices of leftover pizza on the top shelf, a half-full carton of orange juice inside the door, a tub of the healthier-than-butter spread Stiles insists on buying on the middle shelf, and two cans of the cheap beer Stiles claims to like but never actually drinks in the basket at the bottom.

“Christ.”

Derek knew—on some level—that he should probably pick up more groceries at some point. He hasn’t been to the store since the day he moved all his stuff back into the apartment, which was almost two weeks ago now. But the food situation hasn’t seemed like a pressing enough issue for Derek to actually do something about it.

He takes a step back and lets the fridge door swing shut.

“Two grown adults living together, and we can’t even keep our fridge stocked.” Stiles shakes his head. “That’s pretty bad, isn’t it?” He’s twirling the pen from his mouth between his long fingers, and his chin is propped up in his other hand, a lazy smirk on his lips. “We’d be the first to die in the apocalypse.”

“No we wouldn’t.” Derek plucks the pen out of his hand and leans across the table, scrawling a few additions to the grocery list beneath Stiles’s. “I didn’t go to boy scouts for four and a half years for nothing, you know.” He puffs out his chest proudly. “My survival skills are second to none.”

“You keep telling yourself that, big guy.” Stiles swipes the pen back from Derek and adds pop-tarts and lucky charms to the list. “We’ll see how much your ability to tie six different knots really helps when we’re being ambushed by rabid zombies.”

“Zombies?” Derek snorts. “I could take on zombies.”

“Yeah?” Stiles raises an eyebrow at him. “Well, okay then. If your plan of action is to take on hordes of disease-ridden, undead killers single-handedly, that’s fine with me. If you leave the safety of our ninth floor apartment and die while I stay here and survive until the worst of the danger has passed by eating the food we’ve got in our well-stocked fridge, I’m not gonna feel guilty. It’s on you.”

Derek shrugs, conceding the point.

“Maybe we should figure out a grocery schedule or something.”

**October**

“You look rough,” Stiles says, raising his eyebrows at Derek over the rim of his oversized NASA mug. His legs are folded under him, sweatpants riding low on his hips, and his bare feet peek out over the edges of the seat. The newspaper in front of him is open at a the start of the celebrity gossip section, where Stiles is absently filling Kim Kardashian’s teeth in with black biro ink. “There’s fresh coffee in the pot and pastries in the bread bin if you want them.”

Derek shoots him a grateful smile and shuffles further into the kitchen.

“Mid-terms getting to you?”

“Mm.” Derek sleepily fills his mug to the brim with coffee, wincing when some splashes over the side and onto his t-shirt as he lifts it to his lips. “I only have eight more tests to grade.”

Stiles wrinkles his nose in distaste.

“I still don’t get why you volunteered to be a TA.”

“Extra credits,” Derek says.

“Bullshit.” Stiles doesn’t look up from where he’s giving Kim a twirly moustache, but Derek still feels the force of his eye-roll. “You probably take enough classes to triple major.” The pen stills, and Stiles chews his lip thoughtfully for a moment before moving on to Kourtney. She gets an eye-patch and a thick beard. “So why put yourself to all that extra work?”

Stiles fixes him with an open, curious look, like Derek is a puzzle he can’t crack.

Derek shrugs and takes another sip of his coffee.

“My favorite professor from last year told me I’d be good at it.”

His first year TA had been awful—never remembered their names, never handed their assignments back on time, never replied to their emails, and never added any helpful comments next to the large red crosses she left in the margins of their essays—and Derek figured it would be nearly impossible for him to do a worse job of it than she had, so he sent in an application.

Stiles narrows his eyes at Derek.

“Oh my god. You do it because you genuinely want to help people, don’t you?”

Derek drains his mug, fills it straight back up, and takes an apple from the fruit bowl.

“Maybe,” he says. “I’ve never really thought about it.”

“And I thought _Scott_ was ridiculous,” Stiles mutters, adding some sort of hideous bird creature to Kourtney’s shoulder—presumably a parrot, though it looks more like an angry oval with a beak—and Derek watches him for a moment, drawn to the way his long fingers curl around the pen.

It’s a pity Derek doesn’t have time to stand around and admire the view.

“If I want to sleep tonight, I should probably go finish grading those papers,” he says, more for his own sake than for Stiles’s. He nudges Stiles’s chair with his hip as he shuffles past him. “I’ll see you later. Thanks for the coffee.”

**November**

“I said _if_ she asked you out, Scott. It’s a hypothetical situation. You’re not supposed to get caught up in the logistics of it.”

Derek feels his eyebrows rise of their own account as he unties his boots and shucks them off by the front door, setting them down on the shoe-rack beside Stiles’s shabby Adidas trainers and following the sound of voices into the kitchen.

“But she isn’t going to ask me out,” Scott is saying. “She doesn’t like me like that.”

“Well, it _sounds_ like she likes you like that.”

Stiles is gesturing lazily with a pair of chopsticks from where he’s slumped low in his seat, legs kicked up into Scott’s lap, and Scott has one hand curled loosely around his ankle.

They look comfortable—relaxed, happy, weirdly attuned to one another’s movements. Stiles shifts to grab another take-out carton, and Scott automatically adjusts his legs so Stiles’s don’t fall out of his lap.

Seeing them like this makes Derek wish he had a friend like Scott—someone who will stick with him forever, invade his personal space without thinking about it, and drive five hours across the state on Friday night just to sit around his apartment and eat Chinese take-out with him.

“I thought you put a ban on take-out,” Derek says, dropping into the seat opposite Stiles and making a face at him over the dozen or so empty cartons spread out on the table. “Last time I ordered pizza you spent three hours lecturing me about my sodium intake.”

“Dude,” Stiles swings around to face him, a smile blooming on his lips. “Hey. I didn’t hear you come in. I thought you said you were gonna be home late tonight.”

“My class got cancelled,” Derek says. “Finstock caught the flu last week, and he’s refusing to teach until he’s made a full recovery.”

“Wise,” Stiles says. “Intro to Econ students are snotty enough already.”

“History of Economic Thought,” Derek corrects automatically, ignoring Stiles’s smirk. “And it’s not _wise_. I needed him to finish his lecture program last week, but he didn’t, and he still hasn’t, so I’m gonna have to use my seminar time to cover what he missed so the class doesn’t flunk their next assignment.” He pokes one of the empty noodle boxes and sighs. “Did you order take-out while I was out because you thought I wouldn’t find out about it?”

“Sucks, dude. And no, I didn’t, I’m not that petty,” Stiles says, offended. “Scott wanted chow mein, and I am apparently incapable of saying no to him.” He narrows his eyes at Scott, who just smiles back at him. “If I deprive him of too much he’ll never come back and visit me.”

“Not true,” Scott says, looping an arm around Stiles’s neck and ruffling his hair. “But if that’s why your junk food prohibition campaign has been lifted for as long as I’m in town, then sure, you can keep thinking that.” He smiles over at Derek. “Stiles ordered you hoisin beef, sweet & sour chicken, and a whole bunch of egg rolls. We left them in the fridge in case you were hungry when you got in.”

Derek is hungry, and egg rolls are his favorite.

He heats the cartons in the microwave and absently listens to Scott and Stiles bicker over whether or not the girl in Scott’s Biomed class is into him.

“You should ask her out,” Derek says when he’s back in his seat.

“See?” Stiles says, pointing his chopsticks at Scott. “Derek agrees with me.”

His feet have migrated to the floor at some point during his debate with Scott—probably the result of a particularly emphatic gesture—and the tips of his socked toes press into Derek’s calves under the table ever so slightly, a silent thank you for the back-up.

If Derek were braver, he would bump his foot against Stiles’s leg in reply.

**December**

“Dude! This party is _awesome_.”

Stiles nudges against his side, his hands brushing Derek’s aside as he reaches for the bottle of vodka Derek just set down. He unscrews the cap with his teeth and holds it in his mouth as he fills the solo cup in his hand—which has barely an inch of orange juice at the bottom—with vodka.

Derek raises an eyebrow at him.

“You’re going to pass out if you drink all of that,” he says.

He’s seen Stiles get red-cheeked and loose-lipped after half a can of beer.

“It’s not for me,” Stiles assures him. “Your cousin strong-armed me into getting it for her. She said you guys watch her like hawks at Hale house parties.”

“Stop sharing my secrets with the enemy,” Malia snaps from behind them, plucking the cup out of Stiles’s hands and glaring at him over her shoulder as she makes a hasty retreat out of the kitchen door, like she thinks being too close to Derek will get her drink confiscated.

Their family is big, and they don’t know each other particularly well, so she probably sees him the way he sees his older cousins: a fun-sucking, rule-enforcing extension of the adults.

Or worse.

She might see him as an extension of Laura.

“I tried to tell her you wouldn’t do anything if she got her own damn drink,” Stiles says, rolling his eyes at Malia’s retreating back. “But she wouldn’t listen. I don’t think she believed me when I told her you’re about as tough as a bunny rabbit.”

“You know each other?” Derek asks, curious.

“Yeah,” Stiles says. “We were in the same math class in junior year.” He grabs another solo cup from beside the sink and pours himself a weak Malibu and coke. “I still remember how much she used to hate algebra. I had to drag her into the classroom nine times out of ten. Otherwise she’d skip it.”

Derek smiles because he can picture it—Stiles’s hands on Malia’s shoulders, steering her through the door of the classroom, probably spouting about how important to everyday life math is—and Stiles meets his eyes, smiles warmly back at him.

“It’s weird seeing you here,” Derek says, leaning back against the table.

They hardly knew each other before Stiles moved in with him. They went to the same high school, sure, and according to Facebook they’ve been friends since 2011, but they didn’t talk or anything. There was no reason to—Stiles was a freshman when Derek was a senior, and Derek had already moved to college by the time Stiles and Cora became firm friends.

If Boyd hadn’t decided to transfer to Stanford late this summer, leaving Derek with an empty room in his apartment, and if his mom hadn’t explicitly banned him from advertising for a roommate on Craigslist, and if Cora hadn’t known that Stiles was looking for cheap off-campus accommodation, then Stiles wouldn’t be here right now—wouldn’t be one of the people who make it onto the short list of people his sisters call when they’re arranging his annual not-so-surprising surprise birthday party.

Derek knew Stiles would be here—has a Christmas present for him in his room—and he saw him in the lounge earlier, sliding a medium-sized box under the Derek-only Christmas tree, next to Laura’s handwritten sign that reads ‘BIRTHDAY PRESENTS ONLY.’

It had seemed almost natural, at least before Derek really stopped to think about it, for Stiles to be here in his space.

And maybe that’s the part that’s so weird about this.

They’ve never intentionally interacted in Beacon Hills before now, haven’t arranged to see each other once in the week since they drove back from college, and yet here they are, two days before Christmas, talking to each other in the kitchen of Derek’s childhood home as if the jump from barely acquaintances to firm friends is nothing.

Stiles bumps their shoulders together gently.

“You mean weird in a good way, right?”

“Yeah,” Derek agrees. “It’s nice.”

“This party is nice,” Stiles says. “Your family are nice.” He winds an arm around Derek’s shoulders and pulls Derek into a one-armed hug that probably should feel awkward, but mostly leaves Derek feeling off-balance instead. “The cake your mom made is _really_ nice.” He slants a small, sideways smile at Derek. “You’re gonna have get me the recipe.”

**January**

“So,” Stiles says, pausing in his mission to make the asparagus on his plate disappear without putting any in his mouth, just cutting it into smaller and smaller pieces. “This is good, right? You like… this stuff.” He gestures vaguely at the large bowl of salad on the table. “All these vegetables.”

“Yes, Stiles,” Derek says patiently. “I like vegetables.”

Stiles nods a few times, like his neck is attached to a spring, fidgets a little, and then cuts another neat line through a piece of asparagus.

Derek helps himself to more butter-roasted yams.

He knows Stiles wants something—has known it from the moment Stiles announced he was going to cook dinner tonight and threw a seemingly random assortment of Derek’s favorite foods into their grocery cart—but it’s taking Stiles an usually long time to work up to it.

Stiles sets his cutlery down, runs his hands through the short hairs at the back of his neck, picks his cutlery back up again, and lets out an irritated sigh. “This is--” he starts, then cuts himself off again.

Derek fixes him with a pointed look and Stiles grimaces.

“You… um. You like animals, right?”

“I like animals,” Derek agrees.

“Right.” Stiles nods again. “Well, there’s this cat. Scott rescued her last week. She’s small, and cute, and she’s blind in one eye, and his apartment has a no-pets policy, so _he_ can’t keep her, and there’s very little chance she’ll get adopted, since she’s half-blind, and if you saw her I know you’d love her, and I’m just—Derek, can we take her in, please?”

Derek sets his fork down on the side of his plate.

“You want to adopt a cat.”

“Not just any cat! Just this one very specific cat. A cat in need.”

Derek rubs a hand across his forehead.

“We’re not responsible enough to look after a cat,” he says. “And even if we were, it would be unfair to keep one in such a small apartment. I don’t think it would be a good idea.”

Stiles purses his lips together.

“If we don’t take her she’ll have to go into a shelter. Do you know what they do to cats in shelters when they can’t find homes for them? They _kill_ them, Derek. Kill them dead.”

Derek sighs. “Not all shelters are like that.”

“Lots of them are,” Stiles says. “Too many.” His hands bunch and un-bunch in the fabric of his t-shirt. “And even the ones that don’t kill the animals are—you know. Scott’s told me enough horror stories for me to know I don’t want to be solely responsible for a tiny blind kitten to end up there.”

“Isn’t there other people Scott can ask?” Derek asks, a little desperately, because he can already feel his resolve to say no crumbling. “People who go to UCLA?”

“Maybe,” Stiles allows. “But he hasn’t found anyone yet, and it’s not like he can keep hiding a cat in his apartment indefinitely—not without his landlord noticing. His downstairs neighbor has severe allergies.”

Derek sighs again.

“Tell Scott to keep looking for someone to take the cat in,” he says.

Stiles visibly deflates.

“Yeah,” he says. “Okay. I’ll call him.”

He pushes away from the table, abandoning his untouched food.

Derek catches him by the wrist before he goes.

“If he still hasn’t found anyone else by Friday, we’ll talk about this again,” he promises.

He knows he’s screwed when Stiles’s face lights up like Christmas.

**February**

“Say hello to your grandpa, sweetie.”

The cat is curled up on Stiles’s lap, mewling softly as he runs his long fingers through the fur at the back of her neck, and Stiles smiles down at her as he picks up one of her small paws and waves it at the camera at the top of his laptop screen.

A tinny laugh spills out through the speakers.

“I’m still too young to be anyone’s grandpa, kid.”

“Hate to break it to you, pops, but you’re not exactly a spring chicken.” He scoops Tequila up in his arms and gently rubs his chin against the top of her head. “You turn fifty-two next month. Are you sticking to the diet plan I left you? Don’t even try to front with me here—I already know about the donuts that were delivered to the station last week, but I’m willing to let that slide if you promise me you haven’t eaten any red meat.”

Derek forces himself to stop lingering in the doorway like a creeper, bravely takes two steps into the room, and is rewarded by a bright smile, all of Stiles’s attention suddenly shifting to him.

He mumbles a good morning, grabs a smoothie from the fridge, and turns to head back to his room because it’s not even nine on a Saturday morning, and Stiles is being adorable, and Derek’s brain is not ready to deal with any of this.

Stiles snags him by the wrist on his way to the door and drags him into frame before he manages to escape from his clutches.

“Dad,” Stiles says. “This is Derek.”

Derek’s stomach does a nervous flip.

He’s met Stiles’s dad before on a couple of occasions: he did a safety talk at Derek’s school when his badge still read ‘Deputy Stilinski’, back when Derek was in second grade, and he broke up a couple of the high school parties that Derek got dragged along to by the rest of the basketball team. This is the first time Derek has ever seen him without his uniform on.

“Hi, Sheriff,” Derek says.

It’s hardly a lengthy greeting, but his voice still manages to come out stiff and awkward.

“Derek.” The sheriff nods his head at him, smiling wide enough to make the crows feet around his eyes stand out despite the lines of his face being pixelated through the webcam. “I was starting to think Stiles was never going to formally introduce me to you. He certainly has a lot to say about--”

“Dad,” Stiles says, like a warning. “This isn’t a formal introduction. If anything, it’s an informal one.” He rubs his nose behind Tequila’s ear and she purrs. “Don’t make it weird.”

The sheriff holds both hands up in surrender.

“I didn’t know making conversation would make it weird.”

“You’re supposed to make _normal_ conversation,” Stiles says, rolling his eyes. “Tell Derek the story about the badger that bit your new deputy.”

The sheriff does.

Derek doesn’t like being in front of a camera—hates seeing the way his face always looks solemn, and the way the short hairs at the crown of his head stick out—but he sort of likes the picture he, Stiles and Tequila make at the corner of the screen. They look sleep-rumpled. Domestic.

Stiles still hasn’t let go of his wrist.

**March**

“He didn’t need to die,” Stiles says, face pressed into the curve of his elbow. “There was enough room on that stupid door for both of them. If Rose had moved over, or—or if they did the logical thing and took _turns_ to sit on the door, or if the rescue crew had got there a few minutes sooner…”

He trails off with a morbid whine.

Derek pats his head.

He probably should have cut Stiles off after his second can of the disgusting beer he claims to like but never drinks—probably should have noticed the steep plunge Stiles’s sobriety levels had taken when he buried his face in Derek’s shirt and started honest-to-god sniffling when Jack got out his sketchbook—but he didn’t, and now he has no one to blame but himself for the fact Stiles is drunk and weepy.

“It’s just a movie,” he says, stroking a hand through Stiles’s hair.

Stiles grumbles something grouchy and incoherent under his breath, but he shifts until the top of his head is pressed against the flat of Derek’s stomach and arches into his touch nonetheless.

They stay like that until the oven timer goes off a couple of minutes later—Stiles pressed up against Derek, practically purring as Derek pets his head. He makes a low noise of protest when Derek steps away from him.

“Do you want pizza rolls, or not?”

Stiles tilts his head up and gives Derek a ‘no-duh’ look.

“I’m drunk, not brain-dead,” he says, making grabby hands in the oven’s direction. “There’s no way I’m gonna say no to high-quality junk food.” He scratches the side of his nose in thought. “I think I’d probably say yes to pizza rolls on my deathbed if someone offered me them. Let my final meal be a greasy monstrosity.”

“Noted,” Derek says, pulling the tray of them out of the oven and loading them onto a plate. As soon as he sets them down, Stiles reaches for one. “Be careful,” Derek warns, barely resisting the urge to smack his eager hands away before he hurts himself. “They’re probably really hot inside.”

Stiles rolls his eyes and bites into it anyway.

“Oh,” he says. “Oh fuck.”

Derek holds back the ‘I told you so’ on the tip of his tongue, knowing it wouldn’t be appreciated, and quickly gets Stiles a glass of water instead.

“I love you,” Stiles says, sliding his hand up Derek’s forearm as he takes the glass from him, and Derek feels his heart momentarily stop beating in his chest. “You’re the best.” Stiles tilts his head down and submerges his tongue in the water for a few long moments before he takes a long sip. “No, but for real—dude, I’m serious. You’re one of my favorite people in the universe. Top three, probably.”

Derek feels warm and happy and needed.

“Maybe wait a couple of minutes before you try another one,” he says.

**April**

“He won’t even lose any credits!” Stiles is saying happily, barely paying attention to Derek because he’s too busy frantically tapping at his phone—presumably breaking Scott’s big news to everyone before Scott can. “How neat is that?”

“That tends to be how transfers work,” Derek says.

He feels weird—nauseated and kind of numb all at once.

Derek knows he should be happier about Scott transferring to Berkeley, if not for the fact that Stiles is practically bouncing off the walls with excitement, then for the fact Scott is a really nice kid.

He knows Scott has found it hard being on the opposite side of the state to Stiles— _knows_  he hates how long it takes him to go home and visit his mom if he decides he wants to see her for a weekend, and knows that being in the bay area, which is only two hours away from Beacon Hills, will make things a hell of a lot easier on him.

And Scott deserves that.

Really, he does.

But Derek knows that if Scott moves here, Stiles is going to want to live with him. He’s going to pack his stuff up from Derek’s two bedroom apartment and move in with Scott instead, probably in some fun up-and-coming student area rather than the sleepy suburban part of town Derek picked. Maybe they’ll join a fraternity together or something.

And Derek will be stuck here with a gross new roommate from Craigslist.

Christ, he can already picture it.

As if she can sense his misery, Tequila jumps down from Stiles’s lap and winds herself around his ankles, flicking her tail against the back of his knees.

Derek picks her up and lets her paw at his face.

“You know, you look disgustingly cute when you do that,” Stiles tells him, making a face. “Remind me never to let any photography students into our apartment. They’d exploit you for your beauty and pay off their student debts by selling pretentious black-and-white calendars and A2 prints.”

Derek glances over at the One Direction calendar on the back of the fridge—the one that Stiles had stuck up ‘ironically’ some time in early January—and wonders if Stiles will buy a similar one next year when he’s living with Scott.

Next year, his gross Craigslist roomie will probably pick out something even worse. Something truly awful. Probably a Nickleback calendar filled with pictures of Chad Kroeger half-naked.

Derek is not looking forward to it.

**May**

“Shit,” Stiles says, sitting bolt upright in his seat, eyes wild as they cast around the semi-darkness.

In the glow of the fridge’s backlight, Derek can just about make out a sticky note stuck to his cheek from where he fell asleep on his notes. Stiles looks impossibly paler than usual in the darkness, and the dark bags under his eyes make it look like he hasn’t had a good night’s sleep for weeks.

Tequila is curled up on the floor at his feet. She lazily flicks her tail in acknowledgement of Derek, but doesn’t come over to him. Hasn’t come over to him for almost two weeks, now. It’s like she can sense the tension between Stiles and Derek, and wants Derek to know that she’s with Stiles on this.

Or maybe Derek is reading too much into things.

“Sorry,” Derek says, grabbing a can of red bull and closing the fridge. “I didn’t mean to scare you. I wouldn’t have come in here if I knew you were asleep.”

Stiles peels the sticky note off his face and puts it back in the book he must have been reading when he fell asleep. “You wouldn’t have come in here if I were awake, either,” he says, matter of fact, eyes never leaving his hands as he runs his finger across the top of the sticky note, like he wants to make sure it’s going to stay in place. “You’ve been avoiding me.”

“I’m not avoiding you,” Derek says. “It’s just—things are busy.”

Derek runs a hand through his hair and wonders if running away before Stiles can throw any more accusations will do any lasting damage to their relationship. He’s been grading papers for the better part of the last twelve hours. He’s too tired to have this conversation now.

“Busy,” Stiles repeats, tone bitter, and Derek doesn’t need to turn on a light to know he’s narrowing his eyes into the dark. “Too busy to say hello to me when you come home from a lecture? Too busy to answer my texts with anything other than one-word answers? Too busy to tell me what the fuck I’ve done to make you act like this?”

His voice gets louder with each question—louder and angrier.

Tequila flinches, but doesn’t move away from him.

Derek briefly debates turning the light on—as it is, the kitchen is almost pitch black, lit by nothing but the moonlight streaming in through a single window—but he quickly decides against it. Stiles sounds _hurt_ , and Derek doesn’t want to know what that expression looks like on his face if he can avoid it.

He does sit down in the seat opposite Stiles, though.

“I’m sorry,” he says, because he is. Stiles being upset is the last thing he wanted to come from this. “I know I’ve been acting like a douchebag for the last couple of weeks. I owe you an apology.”

He never meant for it to get as out of hand as it did.

He thought if he avoided Stiles for a few days—if he gave himself some space to adjust to the idea of _losing him_ —he might be able to pretend to be okay with it.

The problem is, it was pretty hard to make himself stop once he started doing it.

“No fucking shit you’ve been acting like a douchebag,” Stiles says, dropping his head back down to his books. “Honestly, I don’t know if I even want to talk to you right now. I only confronted you because I was half asleep and I figured you’d just back to your room with your tail between your legs the minute I tried to say something.”

His silhouette looks simultaneously tense and dejected in the moonlight, and Derek wants to touch him—to squeeze his arm, or run his fingers through his hair, or something—but he’s pretty sure he lost the right to do that a couple of weeks ago.

“Stiles,” he says instead. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be so obvious about this.”

“Of course that was you trying not to be obvious.” Stiles sighs. “Next time you get mad at me, please do us both a favor and just—just cut out the crap and tell me what I did. I’m used to being told how annoying I am. I can handle it.”

“No,” Derek says, feeling his cheeks heat up with a combination of indignation on Stiles’s behalf and embarrassment at his own inability to communicate. “It’s not you. You didn’t do anything. I was just… being stupid.”

“That’s all you’re going to say,” Stiles says, flat. “Some _it’s not you, it’s me_ bullshit. That’s—fine.” He closes the book that was in front of him on the table and tucks it under his arm as he stands up. “You know where to find me when you decide you want to be an adult about this.”

“Stiles,” Derek says, helpless. “Wait.”

He’s never been good at making amends or talking about his feelings, but he knows—knows that if he doesn’t fix this right fucking now, he’s never going to be able to come back from this.

He has no choice but to be honest.

“I’m just having a hard time dealing with the thought of you moving out. I know you’re excited, and I know I should be happy for you, and I’m trying, but it’s really hard to be happy about it when I want you to stay.” It’s like a dam inside him has burst—the words pour out before Derek can stop them. “I really like living with you.”

Stiles is still for a long moment, then carefully sits back down.

“Derek,” he says. “Why do you think I’m going to move out? Did you hallucinate me handing in my tenancy notice or something?”

Derek frowns at him.

“You were the one who told me Scott is transferring here.”

“Oh,” Stiles says. “Oh my god.” He smacks Derek on the arm—or tries to, anyway, but mostly hits the table, aim thrown off by the fact they’re still sitting in the dark. “You are such a dumbass. Please tell me you haven’t been brooding for weeks because you thought I was going to ditch you for Scott.”

Derek thumbs the tab on his red bull can.

“I wasn’t brooding,” he says evenly, because that’s the only part he can actually defend.

“Oh my god.” Stiles drops his head onto his arms again. It takes Derek a moment to realize that his shoulders are shaking because he’s _laughing_. “Derek, you idiot. We adopted a cat together. People don’t adopt cats with people they’re going to ditch the minute their best friend decides to transfer to their college.” His feet nudge against Derek’s under the table. “I don’t want to move out,” he says, like he’s never been more sure of anything. “I like it here. I want to live with _you_.”

**June**

_— Eat. Don’t drink too much coffee. Stay hydrated. Good luck today! :-) x_

The note is balanced on top of a box of pastries from Derek’s favorite diner.

He knows Stiles left the apartment hours ago—he had an exam early this morning, and Derek heard him leave sometime around eight AM, but he’d been too engrossed in his own cramming to do more than shout a distracted “good luck” to him through his bedroom door.

It’s finals week. Derek doesn’t feel bad for neglecting his roommate duties just a little.

He has no idea how Stiles finds time to do things like this.

Derek isn’t complaining, though.

He helps himself to a pastry, folds the note and tucks it into his back pocket, and tells himself that next week, when all their finals are over, he’s going to take Stiles out to dinner somewhere nice to thank him for this.

**July**

“Why didn’t you stop me?” Stiles asks, clutching his stomach and groaning. “I swear to god, Derek, I never want to look at another carton of Ben & Jerry’s again.”

Derek snorts. “No one forced you to eat it.”

The apartment is empty, save for the plates and mugs and cutlery that neither of them felt the need to take home for a two month break, and both of their cars are crammed with boxes, and Stiles has spent the better part of the last hour trying to convince Derek to help him eat everything that’s left in their freezer and fridge.

Derek had rolled his eyes and relented slightly, taking the bag of frozen peas, the cheap steaks Stiles bought on special offer one time and never cooked, and a couple of frozen pizzas to their favorite downstairs neighbor’s door. She’s staying in the city to work over the summer. Derek figured she might actually find a use for them.

Stiles had finished a huge tub of ice-cream by the time Derek got back.

“I’m not going to be able to drive for hours,” he complains. “If I try to move right now I’ll probably throw up all over everything.”

“What a pleasant visual,” Derek says, making a face. "So attractive."

Tequila wraps herself around his ankles, mewling until he picks her up, and he lets himself hold her close for a long moment, nuzzling his face into the soft fur at the back of her neck.

“I’m going to miss you,” he admits softly, because it’s easier to say it to the cat than it is to say it to Stiles. “Probably a lot.”

“You can still visit her, you know,” Stiles says, chin propped up in his hands. “It’s not like my house is on a whole other planet. I live less than a mile away from you.”

“I might,” Derek says, setting Tequila down on his lap when he sits.

“You’d better.” Stiles is looking at him with a kind of intensity that isn’t entirely unfamiliar—one that never fails to Derek feel warm to his stomach. “Tequila and I will get lonely without you and wind up singing sad love songs on your porch in the middle of the night if you don’t.”

Derek grimaces at the thought.

He can’t even begin to count the number of times he’s heard Stiles belting out numbers from the never-ending repertoire of Taylor Swift songs he knows some of the lyrics to in the shower, loud and enthusiastic but completely tuneless.

He loves his family too much to subject them to that.

"I’ll come over,” he promises.

“Good.” Stiles absently drags the lid from the empty ice-cream carton back and forth across the table with the tip of his index finger. He’s quiet for a long moment, eyes fixed on Derek’s face. “And maybe,” he says eventually. “Maybe we could try going out some time, if that's something you'd be be interested in.”

Derek feels his mouth go dry.

“Going out,” he repeats, voice catching in his throat and cracking. “Like on a date?”

Stiles plants an elbow on the table and leans forward, like he’s about to deliver a career-defining business pitch. “Hear me out,” he says.

“I like you, and I think you might like me too, and the last year of cohabitation has pretty thoroughly proved that we work pretty well together, so…” Stiles trails off with a shrug. “I thought we could use the summer as a trial period. If we go on a couple of dates and decide it isn’t right for us—” he makes a face. “Well, that would kind of suck, to be honest. But, you know. At least we could say we tried it.”

The way Stiles says it makes it sound so simple.

And maybe it is.

Derek swallows once.

“Yeah,” he says. “I think I'd like that.”

Stiles brushes their knuckles together on top of the table.

“Okay,” he says. “I’ll pick you up on Friday at six.”

**August**

“That wasn’t so bad, was it?”

Stiles is next to him at the sink, elbow-deep in soap suds, washing the dishes while Derek dries the ones he’s already done.

“You and I must have very different definitions of bad,” Derek says, barely resisting the urge to dunk his head into the sink repeatedly in the hope the water can cleanse his brain of the last three hours of his life just as easily as it’s cleaning the plates. He sighs wipes a few stray soap suds off the one in his hand. “That was so much worse than our informal meeting. Your dad is _scary_.”

“We weren’t dating during the informal meeting,” Stiles points out. “And I don’t know what you’re so worked up about. It’s obvious he likes you.”

“He showed me his gun, Stiles. An actual loaded weapon.”

“Yeah,” Stiles says with a broad grin. “Because he wants you to think about the consequences if you ever hurt me.” He elbows Derek gently in the ribs, leaning into him, a warm weight against his side. “That means he thinks this is serious.”

Derek licks his lips and swallows, heart pounding in his ears.

“Is it?”

Stiles flicks some soapy water at him.

“We have a cat, dumbass,” he says. “Of course it is.”

**Author's Note:**

> in case u missed the memo at the start, i'm [falsealpha](http://falsealpha.tumblr.com/) on tumblr. let's be pals :+)


End file.
